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12/13/10

Teachers Are Losing The Reform Battle

There. I said it. We are losing. As I read the blogs, newspaper articles, and comments left, I am seeing many folks resigned to the fact that reform, in the guise of charters, longer days, paternalistic pedagogy, and bribery, will continue until the last ounce of professional dignity among teachers is ground into bits by the boots of the oligarchs and their puppets in government.

I have no faith in the intelligence of those in charge. Look what they have done so far--hired a publisher as an educational leader for the largest school district in the country, published the names and rankings of teachers in L.A. of a widely regarded as crap measure of competence, fired hundreds of teachers, closed schools and replaced them with schools that are no better (how could they be?), and all led by a former b-baller turned top education officer in the richest country in the world(?).

I am finished with the reform movement. It is a scam, just like everything else rich people control.

It's time to take our schools away from those who are destroying them. It's time for a national strike.

I propose that no teacher return from Winter Break until some conditions are met:

1. End RTTT and NCLB.

2. Replace Arne Duncan with an educator.

3. Require charter schools to find their own buildings and not take them away from existing schools.

4. End high-stakes testing in favor of portfolios judged by teachers.

5. Raise starting pay of teachers to attract a better pool of talent--pay for it by taxing billionaires.